A FORMER Belfast mayor and a prominent Catholic priest havebacked calls for leniency to be shown to a youth workerjailed this week for his part in a riot.

Former mayor Martin Morgan and Holy Cross priest Fr AidanTroy have appealed for a reduction in the two-year prisonsentence imposed against Ardoyne youth worker FernandoMurphy.

On Tuesday the 29-year-old was jailed for two years afterpleading guilty to attempted GBH, riotous behaviour andpossession of a hammer during rioting in Ardoyne on July 122004.

Judge Tom Burgess described the father-of-two’simprisonment as “inevitable although regrettable”.

Mr Burgess said he was satisfied Mr Murphy’s actions hadnot been typical of his normal behaviour and that he hadbeen involved in “constructive work” with young people inArdoyne in recent years.

Holy Cross priest Fr Aidan Troy said Mr Murphy acceptedthat he had to be punished but felt the jail sentence wasexcessive.

“I have seen the excellent work which Fernando has donewith the young people in Ardoyne since I first arrived in2001,” he said.

“He has been involved in bringing young people away fromthe interfaces to places like Medjugorje and has taken partin courses to help with the problem of young people innorth Belfast taking their own lives.

“Fernando accepts what he did was wrong and that it was amoment of madness for which he has to be punished.

“But we feel that sending this young man to prison isdepriving his two sons of a father and Ardoyne of a muchneeded youth worker.

“He has never been in trouble with the police before andhas no criminal record.

“We are appealing for the courts to look at this case againand to allow for some other form of justice.”

Fr Troy said that the father-of-two had continued to beinvolved in cross-community work despite receiving loyalistdeath threats in the past.

“In 2002 he had to leave his job in the Post Office afterreceiving deaths threats from loyalist paramilitaries afterthe murder of Danny McColgan.

“Despite this Fernando continued his cross-community work.”

Former Belfast mayor Martin Morgan backed calls for areview of the 29-year-old’s sentence.

“Everyone accepts that Fernando needs to be punished but itis hugely excessive that he received a two-year jail term,”he said.

“When I was mayor I wrote to Lord Chief Justice Brian Kerrto complain that a known loyalist was given 200 hourscommunity service after he claimed that a gun found hiddenin his bedroom had been dug up by his dog.

“Fernando is not asking for special treatment – he justwants to be treated fairly.”

Is political instability contagious? We all know that thepolitical situation in poor old Neverneverland has been ina mess for years since a certain misbegotten election.

But surprise, surprise, suddenly it seems that the diseasehas spread across the Irish Sea to the very top ofBritain’s political powerhouse. Tony Blair, the mostpopular Labour prime minister in years, winning electionafter election, suddenly finds himself assailed by amutinous mob of disgruntled back-benchers. A disloyal whipand junior ministers, demanding that he step down in favourof the pushful Chancellor of the Exchequer, Scots-bornGordon Brown, long-time rival for the leadership butgenerally considered as dour and lacking charisma. Blairmade the mistake earlier by announcing that he would resignbefore the next election, allowing time for a successor totake over the reins of government as prime minister.Political experts warned of the danger that, in the eyes ofaspiring cabinet ministers for the new regime, Blair mightfind himself increasingly, as the time for his departureloomed, becoming a political ‘dead duck’.

Now it seems the warning has become a reality with thenaming of a rebel group determined to oust Blair as quicklyas possible and with dark hints that a plot has beenorchestrated by an impatient Chancellor of the Exchequer.

As if to head off the conspiracy the pro Labour tabloid TheSun claimed in a front-page scoop that Blair has alreadydecided to resign the party leadership on May 31 next andhand over the premiership to his successor in July. By thattime he will have recorded 10 years and 12 weeks as thelongest-serving Labour prime minister.

Careless of the danger of splitting the Labour governmentwide open by trying to emulate the Tory power-brokers whodispatched Margaret Thatcher in tears from 10 DowningStreet, the prime minister’s back-bench critics hope to bejoined by, among others, a few incompetent Labour ex-cabinet ministers who have never forgiven Blair for theirsacking by pressing for his immediate departure.

If they succeed – and the Tories can’t believe their luckwith Blair out of the reckoning at the next election –there will be no tears from Blair as he walks out from No10. Banking on his popularity in the US there is likelihoodof a lucrative speaking tour of America and a bestseller,telling in one or two volumes the secret history of his 10years at the top in world politics.

As I write, the Labour party and government is in turmoiland Blair is forced to make a public statement apologisingto the public for the hare-brained party revolt which headmits has treated the electorate as if it was irrelevant.

He promises to resume responsibility as prime minister butconfirms that he will resign as head of the government in12 months’ time. So, hounded by an unfriendly Britishmedia, Blair faces nightmarish last months in the bunker atNo 10.

Meantime, over here on this side of the Irish Sea thealmost forgotten Norn Iron political parties are back fromholidays and, commenting on the antics at Westminster,affect to be unconcerned who takes over as prime minister –Blair, dedicated to the Good Friday Agreement, or theunknown quantity, Scots Presbyterian Gordon Brown, who hasstudiously kept clear of involvement in the Ulsterpolitical jungle. The unionists have clearly beeninvestigating his ancestry and discovered that he had anOrange grandfather from Donegal!

On the other hand, Brown is suspect of tightening the screwon the high cost of the sick counties. Is he responsiblefor the outlandish NI rates bills which threaten to producea middle-class uprising with threats to go to jail ratherthan pay up?

But are they naive not to be concerned about the future oftheir master at the very moment when Secretary of StateHain (up to his neck in the Westminster power struggle) hasannounced that the last ditch negotiations to restore theStormont power-sharing executive will take place inOctober. Hain suggests that the negotiators should meet ata venue in Scotland, far away from the madding crowdsyelling all the age-old slogans.

St Andrew’s and Gleneagles are among the places consideredas the location for the final show. Blair and Bertie Ahernsay this is their last chance. If the talks fail once againby the November deadline the unfortunate 108 assemblymembers elected to a ghost Stormont assembly will be sackedand plan B announced.

History repeating itself?

Secretary of State Hain emulating Oliver Cromwell in 1653standing on the top of the stairs at Stormont telling themembers of the rump ‘assembly’ – “In the name of

In the judicial system it has to be accepted thatsentencing is not an exact science.

Judges have a list of guidelines and parameters but no twocases are precisely the same and a range of factors must betaken into account.

These can include the age of the defendant, previousrecord, guilty plea and family background. Evidence aboutthe character of an accused person is permitted and judgescan request reports from probation and health professionalsto help them determine the appropriate sentence.

However, judges have no jurisdiction over maximum terms,which are set by Parliament.

In general, the public understands there are restrictionsin place but people are entitled to express frustration ifthey feel the legal system – which includes the police,lawyers, judges and legislature – has let them down.

The media is also entitled to reflect public concern and tohold the legal system to account. Those within the systemwho believe they have been portrayed unfairly are alsoentitled to speak out.

Two recent cases illustrate why there is sometimes publicdisquiet over sentencing.

Earlier this week nationalist politicians were critical ofthe suspended terms and fines handed down to five loyalistswho had been caught with metal bars, balaclavas and plasticgloves in 2003.

The men, including a former Royal Irish Ranger, hadoriginally been charged with UVF membership and possessionof equipment for carrying out acts of terrorism but thesecounts were later dropped.

There are a number of disturbing elements to this case andquestions remain about the intentions of those involved.

Interestingly, the defendants arrived in court with packedbags and clearly expected to be going to jail.

The judge said imprisonment would be merited but, takinginto account the length of time since the offence, believedit was right to impose suspended terms.

The second case, which has caused dismay for differentreasons, involves Fernando Murphy, a former footballer whowas jailed for two years after admitting having a clawhammer during rioting in Ardoyne in July 2004.

His family are questioning why he lost his liberty whilethe five loyalists walked free, particularly as evidencewas given about his good character and constructive work hehad carried out in the community, a point acknowledged bythe judge.

It is accepted that the charges in both cases were seriousand deserved to be treated as such by the courts.

However, it is difficult to understand why one case meriteda significant custodial term and the other did not.

These are just two examples of cases which have causeddisquiet but it is appropriate that sentencing policy andthe workings of the legal system are subject to scrutinyand legitimate concerns raised.

The blow inflicted on America by September 11 wasunprecedented in its scale and horror. But is it really thedate to remember? Five years on, it's clear that the trueturning point for the world came seven days later.

By Jonathan Raban08 September 2006

Woken by the jarring peal of the phone at 5.58am, Pacifictime, I heard a friend's voice say, "Turn on your TV! Turnon your TV!" Then she hung up. Groggy with sleep, I clickedthe remote, and the screen bloomed into a scene of aghastconfusion. I was still dopily figuring out the what andwhere when, at 6.03, the second plane, arrowing at a tiltthrough a sky of flawless blue, penetrated the strangelypliant flesh of the south tower like a whaler's barbedharpoon. At the very moment of impact, one could see theplane's nose-cone simultaneously protruding slightly fromthe far side of the skyscraper. Was it a bystander, or thecameraman, who shouted "Ho-ly shit!"?--words, inadequate asthey were, that now seem so inseparably glued to thatastounding instant that I've never been able to speak themsince.

For the next few hours, with the BBC on the computerscreen, CNN on the TV, and the phone ringing off the hook,I felt the world shrinking around me. By mid-afternoon, NewYork, London, Honolulu, Paris, Seattle, had contracted intoone neighbourhood, and when, next morning, Le Monde ran itsfamous banner headline, WE ARE ALL AMERICANS NOW, thesentiment seemed so obvious as to be hardly worth stating.Now, of course, that headline is remembered only because itis a bitterly sarcastic marker of the enormous distancewe've all travelled in the five years since that day.

"Since September 11..." we say, as if the attacks were whatchanged everything. The month is right but the day wrong,because the real metamorphosis has arisen not so much fromwhat Mohamed Atta and his co-conspirators did to us onSeptember 11 as what we've subsequently done to ourselves -and continue to do, today, tomorrow, and in the foreseeablefuture (incredibly foreshortened though that has become).On September 12, still in shock at the extraordinary injuryinflicted on the US, we woke to essentially the same worldwe'd been living in before the phones began to ring. Thedeath toll - then estimated at 10,000-plus - washorrifying, on the scale of a major earthquake or tsunami,but the globe continued to revolve on its accustomed axis,as it does after even the most devastating seismic killers.

On the evening of the 11th, the President of the UnitedStates - last seen in a second-grade class at a Floridaelementary school, staring numbly at The Pet Goat inReading Mastery II: Storybook I - read haltingly to camerafrom a script: "These acts of mass murder were intended tofrighten our nation into chaos and retreat, but they havefailed. Our country is strong. A great people has beenmoved to defend a great nation." On the 14th, he found avoice and a persona when, dressed in a clerical-greyanorak, he visited the firefighters and rescue workers atthe ruins of the World Trade Center. As The Dallas MorningNews reported the next day: "When he climbed onto thewreckage of a fire truck to speak through the bullhorn, theworkers began complaining: 'George, we can't hear you!'

"'I can hear you,' Bush responded. 'I can hear you. Therest of the world hears you. And the people who knockedthese buildings down will hear all of us soon!' The crowdwhooped and then the chant began: 'U-S-A, U-S-A.' Bushgrabbed a small American flag and waved it high."

On the 16th, when Bush spoke of "this crusade, this war onterrorism", the alarming and foolishly inflated languagechilled much of the listening world even as, perhaps, itstirred his electoral base of fundamentalist Christians toheroic thoughts of sword and cross, liberating the holyplaces from Muslim occupation. Presumably unintentionally(unless a Swiftian ironist was at work in some back room inthe White House), the phrase echoed Osama bin Laden, whohad been calling Americans "Crusaders" in repeated fatwasand speeches since 1998.

But September 18 is the real date to circle. That day,Congress rushed through its Authorisation For Use ofMilitary Force (AUMF), entitling the President, as thenation's commander in chief, to "use all necessary andappropriate force" against "those nations, organisations,or persons" that "he determines" were responsible for theSeptember 11 atrocities, "...in order to prevent any futureacts of international terrorism against the United Statesby such nations, organisations, or persons." It's the"such" that's the key, the inclusion of nations,organisations, or persons "of that sort", which nicelycovers, for instance, the invasion of Iraq, the arrest anddetention of most of the prisoners now languishing inGuantanamo Bay, possible future military action againstIran, or Syria, or both, and heaven knows what else, since"such" is a term of potentially limitless capacity to makehitherto unguessed-at likenesses and connections.

The sloppily-worded AUMF endowed the administration withunique and wide-ranging powers. It has become the licencefor the executive branch to wave at Congress and thejudiciary whenever its actions are questioned or censured.On September 18 2001, the delicate balance between thethree branches of government, as laid out in the Americanconstitution, was thrown severely out of whack; since thatday, one branch, the presidency, has enjoyed anunprecedented primacy over the others, and we've beenliving with the consequences of AUMF ever since.

On the same day that Bush talked of the coming "crusade",Vice-President Dick Cheney told the host of Meet The Presshow the new war was going to function. "We... have to worksort of the dark side... We're going to spend time in theshadows in the intelligence world. A lot of what needs tobe done here will have to be done quietly, without anydiscussions... It is a mean, nasty, dangerous, dirtybusiness out there, and we have to operate in that arena."So it was to be cloak and dagger stuff, top secret, withthe administration "working the dark side", out of view ofthe people. Secrecy has its own romantic allure, and in theshaken and frightened mood of America that September, therewas reassurance in the idea of the White House goingundercover, stealthily prowling on our behalf in Cheney'sarena of shadows. Barely a voice was raised to suggest thata secret presidency might not be entirely compatible withthe basic principles of American democracy. On the "You'reeither with us or against us" principle, enunciated by Bushin November 2001, the few liberals who spoke out againstthe new-style covert administration were condemned out ofhand as siding with terrorists.

The threat of terrorism yet to come gave the White House anunimpeded freedom to act on its own discretion that most USpresidents have probably dreamed of, but is more oftenexercised by dictators, benevolent and otherwise. Suchextravagant presidential liberty can only be maintained ina democracy so long as the threat is not just real, butimmediately palpable to the electorate. The enormousquantity of ugly hardware that has shown up on the streetsof American cities in the last five years serves a dualpurpose: it supposedly protects us from acts of terrorismand daily reminds us of the danger we are in.

Some time in early 2002, a nondescript rectangular greybox, with a tall vented pipe and a radio antenna, appearedon a telephone pole in my neighbourhood in Seattle, and Idrove past it several times before I figured what it was -a device for sniffing pathogens in the air, like anthrax orricin, and reporting back to headquarters, wherever theymight be. The conspicuous presence of the box alarmed me alot more than any of my previous thoughts of chemical andbiological attack, and I was glad to see it gone a few dayslater - no doubt moved to another neighbourhood to put asmall shiver down their spines (apparently these boxes cost$25,000 apiece and are consequently in rather shortsupply). So it is with all the blast shields and concretebarriers, security checkpoints, metal detectors, X-raymachines, and the new generation of "smart" videosurveillance cameras, described, in rather too wide-eyedprose, by a reporter for The New York Times a couple ofyears ago: "Sophisticated new computer programs willimmediately alert the police whenever anyone viewed by anyof the cameras placed at buildings and other structuresconsidered terrorist targets wanders aimlessly in circles,lingers outside a public building, pulls a car onto theshoulder of a highway, or leaves a package and walks awayfrom it. Images of those people will be highlighted incolour at the city's central monitoring station, allowingdispatchers to send police officers to the sceneimmediately."

Such measures are here, we're told, to keep us safe--andalso to scare our socks off. For the unique power of thisadministration depends on Americans staying frightened ofanother September 11 - or worse. Every actual terroristevent - the Bali bombing, the Madrid train bombings, theLondon Tube and bus bombings, the Mumbai train bombings,the 10 August revelation of the alleged London-and-High-Wycombe plot to down transatlantic airliners - strengthensthe presidency's hand against the other two governmentbranches. The first American consequence of the news fromLondon last month was the announcement by Alberto Gonzales,the US Attorney General, that the administration wouldstand firm on military tribunals - otherwise, kangaroocourts - at Guantanamo, in the face of the latest SupremeCourt ruling in its disfavour.

The reality of terrorism and the manufactured illusion ofterrorism now bleed seamlessly into one another. Thesporadic attacks launched by real terrorists have so farbeen insufficient to keep the attention-deficit-proneelectorate in lockstep with the presidency, so phantomshave to be continually summoned from the deep in order tojuice-up the fear level and justify administrationpolicies. When facts fail, fiction is always at hand tofill the breach, and White House speechwriters appear tobelieve that no story is as good as an old story retold,however slender its basis. Just last week President Bush,speaking to a captive audience of veterans at an AmericanLegion convention in Salt Lake City, said once again thatIraq "is the central front in our fight againstterrorism... If we give up the fight in the streets ofBaghdad, we will face the terrorists in the streets of ourown cities."

"The terrorists" used once to mean the dubious entity ofal-Qa'ida. Now it's an umbrella term, spread ever wider toshelter an astonishing variety of administration-designatedbad guys: Hamas, Hizbollah, Kashmiri separatists, theTaliban, Ba'athist insurgents, Sunni jihadists, the MahdiArmy, the governments of Iran, Syria, North Korea. It'slike Falstaff conjuring ever greater numbers of enemiesheroically fought off: two, four, seven, 11 men inbuckram... So Bush multiplies terrorists, and counts themby the million. Now they surround us on every flank andquarter, and if we don't fight them abroad (the traditionalresort of domestically weak presidencies), we'll findourselves combating them, hand to hand, on Walnut andJackson in our own home town.

Nowhere is the ambition of this administration soeloquently displayed as in the peculiar institution ofGuantanamo Bay, which is the very model (to loosely quoteWS Gilbert) of a modern military dictatorship. Bush, who,in the 2000 presidential debates denounced the idea of"nation building", has, at Guantanamo, constructed a tinyoffshore statelet, answerable to no laws except thosedictated by the White House and its military andintelligence agencies. Here is detention without charge,trial, or access to lawyers. Here - by all accounts - theline between legitimate interrogation and torture hasrepeatedly been crossed. Here is one small world that, inevery ascertainable particular, is the polar opposite ofthe United States as the founders conceived the nation: nochecks or balances, no Bill of Rights, nothing except theunbridled exercise of executive-branch power.

The administration has treated Guantanamo as an exceedinglyprecious possession, tigerishly protecting it from theintrusions of the judiciary. Time and again, the SupremeCourt has ruled, or tried to rule, that the camp'sdetainees have rights under American law. Time and again,the Attorney General and his crew of adminstration lawyershave managed to find an escape route in the small print ofthe ruling. On each occasion, Bush loyalists, in Congressand elsewhere, have angrily denounced both the judgment andthe judges who formed the "liberal" majority in the court.In March this year, the recently retired Supreme Courtjustice, Sandra Day O'Connor (herself a Republican and aReagan appointee to the court) warned that such attackscould be seen as the first signs of a slide intodictatorship. As Nina Totenberg, the legal correspondent ofNational Public Radio reported: "Pointing to theexperiences of developing countries and former Communistcountries where interference with an independent judiciaryhas allowed dictatorship to flourish, O'Connor said we mustbe ever-vigilant against those who would strongarm thejudiciary into adopting their preferred policies. It takesa lot of degeneration before a country falls intodictatorship, she said, but we should avoid these ends byavoiding these beginnings."

Coming from a middle-of-the-road Supreme Court justice,this was a remarkable measure of the extremity of thesetimes, articulating as it did the fear of many Americansthat the United States under the Bush administration isinching towards the kind of regime on view at GuantanamoBay.

Warrantless wiretapping, detention without trial, the mostsecretive presidency on record, rupture between thebranches of government... Terrorism has supplied thepretext for all of this, but none of it has flowedinevitably from the events of September 11. "Mass murder"was the President's first call on that appalling day, andhad the jihadists continued to be treated as massmurderers, the United States would have retained the warmsympathy and enthusiastic cooperation of the rest of thecivilised world. But the administration, supported by aloyal Republican majority in Congress, and armed with thecarte blanche of AUMF, chose another far more dangerous,lonely and audacious route.

Five years on, we're mired in the bloody wreckage of Iraq(and the rising chaos of Afghanistan). The US isincreasingly isolated from its traditional allies. At home,Americans are more bitterly divided than at any time sincethe Civil War. A small but growing minority of Muslims aretelling British pollsters that they admire the jihadists.Osama bin Laden is still free, making regular broadcasts tohis followers. As the "global war on terror" has proceeded,governments - in Britain as in America - have erectedaround us all the necessary machinery of the security-and-surveillance state.

This is an anniversary so cheerless that any straw is worthclutching at. Here's a straw: in the most recent polls, thenumber of Americans who believe that Saddam Hussein waspersonally involved in the September 11 plot, which stoodat 80 per cent in 2002, and 64 per cent early in 2005, hasnow slipped to the high twenties - roughly the samenumbers, give or take a percentage point, as those of theconspiracy theorists who believe that the Bushadministration planned the atrocities, or at least allowedthem to happen, in order to further its imperial ambitionsin the Middle East. Bush's presidential rhetoric has neverbeen so widely disbelieved. The fiction that in Iraq we'refighting terrorists abroad to stop them attacking us athome is increasingly being recognised for what it is. Theadministration's renewed efforts to conflate every militantIslamic organisation across the globe into a singlehomogeneous force, the terrifying equal of Nazism, fascism,and Soviet Communism, is at last beginning to ring hollowin the ears of a distinct majority of Americans. ThePresident's approval-ratings (between 36 per cent and 38per cent last week) suggest that he is now very nearly downto his unshakeably faithful core base.

Were the Democrats to gain control of the House ofRepresentatives and/or the Senate in the November mid-termelections (not very likely but certainly possible), thatwould at least restore the separation of powers, allowing aDemocratic legislative branch to check and balance theRepublican executive. Unless and until that happens, theBush administration is likely to go on using the images andmemories of September 11 to reinforce and justify theenormous boost of power it received on September 18. Whatfurther discord this turbocharged presidency may engineerhere and in the larger world between now and January 2009is the stuff of international bad dreams.

A US Senate report yesterday squashed any lingeringconcerns that Saddam Hussein might have had a hand in theSeptember 11 attacks, concluding from evidence gatheredbefore and after the 2003 invasion of Iraq that Saddam hadno relationship with al-Qa'ida and viewed the organisationas a threat to his regime.

Over the past couple of years President Bush hasacknowledged, with varying degrees of forthrightness, thatSaddam had nothing to do with 9/11.

In the run-up to the invasion, however, senioradministration officials - notably Vice-President DickCheney - played up supposed links between Saddam and AbuMusab al-Zarqawi, the al-Qa'ida associate killed earlierthis year, and suggested Iraqi intelligence agents had metthe 9/11 ringleader Mohammed Atta in Prague shortly beforethe attacks on the Pentagon and World Trade Centre.

The Senate committee report found no credible evidence ofany contact between al-Qa'ida and the Iraqi governmentother than a 1995 meeting between an Iraqi intelligenceofficer and Bin Laden in Sudan, at which nothing wasoffered or promised.

It found evidence of at least two occasions, meanwhile,when Saddam specifically rebuffed overtures from al-Qa'ida.

"Post-war findings indicate that Saddam Hussein wasdistrustful of al-Qa'ida and viewed Islamic extremists as athreat to his regime, refusing all requests from al-Qa'idafor material or operational support," it concluded.

The report confirmed that Zarqawi was in Baghdad betweenMay and November 2002 - a fact much played up by Mr Cheneyin the invasion's immediate aftermath - but said he wasvery far from welcome there. Instead, Saddam attempted,unsuccessfully, to track him down and capture him. Untilthe US invasion, Zarqawi was affiliated with Ansar al-Islam, a radical group in Kurdish-controlled territory innorthern Iraq and unconnected to Saddam.

The report sifted through much of the pre-war intelligenceon Iraq and al-Qa'ida as well as post-war findings, andfound scant evidence even there - despite what it calledthe "forward-leaning" analysis of the CIA and otheragencies who were "purposely aggressive" in their effortsto find any links and play them up.

Over and above its significance in tracing the US path towar in Iraq, the report is also likely to become fodder forthe mid-term election campaign, now in full swing. Theintelligence committee's senior Democrat, John Rockefellerof West Virginia, accused the Bush administration ofplaying on popular fear in the wake of 9/11 to justifyAmerica's invasion of Iraq.

His Republican counterpart, Pat Roberts of Kansas,preferred to characterise the path to war as "a tragicintelligence failure" and said attacks by Democrats were"little more than a vehicle to advance election-yearpolitical charges".

The report was the Senate intelligence committee's secondlook at the run-up to the Iraq war. The first, issued morethan two years ago, looked at the CIA's failings inassessing Iraq's - ultimately non-existent - weapons ofmass destruction.

Publication of the second report has been held uprepeatedly by arguments over how much of it to keepclassified and how much to make public.

National security and the so-called war on terror was a bigfactor in President Bush's re-election in 2004. His loss ofcredibility in Iraq may sink his Republican Party in thecongressional elections on 7 November.

It was the day the world was united behind the US, but thefive years since 9/11 have seen division and hostility.Denis Staunton looks at the personal and political legacy

Theresa Mullan always carries two prayer cards - one forher husband Pat, who died last year, and the other for herson Michael, a firefighter who was killed when the SouthTower of the World Trade Center collapsed on September11th, 2001.

Michael, who lived with his parents, died trying to rescueanother firefighter who was trapped on an upper floor afterthe emergency workers' walkie-talkies failed.

"Michael loved life. He hugged it, he kissed it, hebreathed it. He loved concerts and the theatre. He lovedPavarotti, Frank Sinatra. He loved good food, goodrestaurants, a good bottle of wine and a Guinness. He had amillion girlfriends. Michael was the bearer of all themerriment in the house. He called that morning from histruck to say goodbye to us and to tell us he loved us. So Ithink in his heart of hearts, he knew he may not comehome," she says.

Theresa Mullan blames 9/11 for her husband's death too,convinced that he lost the will to live after Michael'sdeath and the events of five years ago haunt her every day.

"It's a part of my existence now. I go to Mass everymorning and my communion is the same every morning - forall those who died so tragically on 9/11 and for all thosewho mourn their loss," she says.

Marianne Barry's husband Maurice was a port authoritypolice officer who had been on duty at the World TradeCenter when it was bombed in 1993 and was there again on9/11. Their son John had started college and just movedinto student accommodation and the Barrys planned to visithim that evening.

"I was in work and someone came in with the TV and showedthe towers collapsing. It was going on and on, you know,just repeating that same vision all day. I knew my husbandwas over there but it really didn't sink in that anythingwas going to happen to him because he was there also in '93and he came home. So I had no doubt that he was going tocome home. But he didn't," Marianne says.

Maurice had rescued three groups of workers and was goingup for the fourth time when the tower collapsed. His gunwas recovered, but the family received no remains to buryand for Marianne, Ground Zero is a cemetery.

"There's not a day goes by that I don't think of him andwhat happened. He was 47. He would have been 48 two weeksafter the attack. He loved the children. He couldn't havedone enough for them. Both of my sons have gone back toschool. One has gotten a degree. He's in the US army alsoand he was almost called over to Iraq which was a terriblethought for me. But so far we're trying to get our lifeback. It's been a struggle but we're trying," she says.

When Americans mark the fifth anniversary of the 9/11attacks on Monday, they will mourn those who died on one ofthe most terrible and significant days in their country'shistory. The anniversary will raise questions, however,about how safe the US is today, the balance betweensecurity and civil liberties and how America is viewedthroughout the world.

In the days that followed the attacks, the world ralliedround America, offering sympathy and support, with Le Mondefamously declaring "Nous sommes tous américains" ("We areall Americans").

Governments in Europe and elsewhere offered unprecedentedsecurity co-operation and worked closely with Washington toapprehend suspected Islamist terrorists. When the US movedto topple the Taliban regime in Afghanistan, which hadharboured Osama bin Laden and his followers, a broadinternational coalition provided troops and other support.

At the end of the invasion, Iran was among the countriesthat worked most closely with the US to broker a dealbetween Afghan factions that led to the formation of HamidKarzai's government.

At home, as New Yorkers united around the leadership offormer mayor Rudy Giuliani, dubbed "Churchill in a baseballcap", politicians in Washington overcame the bitterness ofthe disputed presidential election a few months earlier andthe country fell in behind President George W Bush.

After a faltering start, Bush found a voice that chimedwith Americans' yearning for a sense of common purpose inthe face of the attacks, at once defiant and compassionate.

"There was a magical time after that when people cametogether in this country in ways we had almost forgotten.It was a golden time and terrorists everywhere weresuddenly in trouble and they knew it," says David Gergen,who runs the Centre for Public Leadership at Harvard's JohnF Kennedy School of Government and served as an adviser tofour US presidents.

Five years on, anti-Americanism has reached unprecedentedlevels in Europe, Latin America and, above all, in theMiddle East. For critics, Guantánamo has become an emblemof the deformation of American justice, Abu Ghraib of thecorruption of American values and the war in Iraq of thearrogance of its foreign policy.

Within the US, the unity of the days following 9/11 hasgiven way to bitter polarisation and deep divisions,particularly over Iraq, a war that most Americans nowbelieve has made their country less secure.

"The president and his administration failed to bring thecountry together on Iraq and they didn't seem to care. Iraqhas become the most divisive issue since Vietnam and itcould have the same tragic ending," says Gergen.

During the months before 9/11, Europeans complained thatBush, who had come to power declaring he had no interest innation-building, was leading the US into a new period ofisolationism. Bush abandoned his predecessor's efforts toachieve a deal between Israel and the Palestinians andsignalled that the US was no longer in the business ofrescuing failed states or intervening in civil wars as inYugoslavia.

Within the administration, however, a group around thevice-president Dick Cheney, the assistant secretary ofdefence Paul Wolfowitz and defence policy adviser RichardPerle were pressing for a more assertive foreign policy.This neoconservative group argued that America's status asthe sole superpower after the collapse of the Soviet Unionoffered a unique opportunity to reshape the world order,promoting the emergence of pro-US democracies to create aPax Americana.

"That was dangerous nonsense . . . Our forces of deterrenceare overwhelming but we do not have the power, actingalone, to force others to do our bidding," says Gergen.

In the months that followed 9/11, however, theneoconservatives became dominant within the administration,drowning out more cautious voices from the state departmentand the CIA. Within weeks of the attacks, they hadpersuaded Bush that toppling Saddam Hussein would eliminatethe most powerful sponsor of international terrorism,liberate the Iraqi people and create a pro-Americandemocracy pumping out millions of barrels of oil every day.

The neoconservatives believed that Saudi Arabia would reactto the emergence of a democratic Iraq by itself embracingreform and that Iranians would be inspired to rise up andoverthrow the mullahs.

As the neoconservatives shaped US policy abroad, Cheneypromoted a concept of presidential authority that wasunprecedented in its expansiveness. According to thisdoctrine, the declaration of a "war on terror" gave Bushauthority to bypass Congress and suspend civil liberties inthe pursuit of terrorists.

A number of Bush's post-9/11 moves, including theinterception of domestic phone calls without a warrant andthe suspension of Geneva Convention rights for Guantánamoinmates, have been struck down by US courts. Bush admittedthis week that, in the days after the attacks, heauthorised a network of secret prisons overseas, where theCIA held and interrogated almost 100 suspected terrorists.

Lee Hamilton, a Democratic congressman for 34 years and co-chairman of the commission that investigated the 9/11attacks, identifies the expansion of presidential power asone of the most disturbing developments of the past fiveyears.

"What I don't want to see is power put anywhere unchecked.It's time that the Congress of the United States startedacting like a separate but equal branch of government," hesays.

Hamilton is also concerned that new powers of surveillancegiven to the government under the Patriot Act couldpermanently change the balance between security and civilliberties.

"These powers ought to be reviewed and, if need be, checkedby an independent authority. There is no reason why weshouldn't safeguard our liberties as vigorously as wesafeguard our security," he says.

With the Iraq war costing $1 billion (€781 million)a weekand the Bush administration resisting calls to rescind taxcuts for the richest Americans, resources for homelandsecurity are limited. Cities such as New York andWashington complain that homeland security funds are notallocated according to the risk of attack but are spreadacross the country for political reasons.

Newark, New Jersey, admitted last year that it had usedhomeland security funds to pay for 10 brand-new, air-conditioned garbage trucks and grants have been channelledto remote, rural areas that are unlikely terrorist targets.

"What depresses me is that, five years after 9/11, thereare still clear and common-sense things the US should bedoing to counter terrorism that we are not doing," saysHamilton.

Among the unfulfilled recommendations of the 9/11commission are emergency response plans for every majorcity and town in the country, the allocation of part of thebroadcast spectrum to emergency communications and thechecking of all airline passengers' names against a centralwatch-list.

Despite predictions that nothing would ever be the sameafter 9/11, life in America has in many ways returned tonormal and the economy recovered from the shock withremarkable speed. The Dow Jones Industrial Average returnedto pre-9/11 levels just 40 days after the attacks and eventhe tourist and construction industries bounced backquickly.

The quagmire in Iraq has weakened the neoconservatives, whonow complain bitterly that the state department and the CIAhave regained control of US foreign policy. Secretary ofstate Condoleezza Rice, about whom the neoconservatives areprivately venomous, has steered US policy back towardsmultilateralism and cold-hearted realism.

If the Democrats take control of the House ofRepresentatives or the Senate in November, theadministration will face more intense congressionaloversight. Court rulings have already forced Bush to rollback his expansion of presidential authority and to seekcongressional approval for the domestic spying programmeand for military tribunals to try Guantánamo inmates.

Profile: Gordon Brown has long believed that his destiny isto become British prime minister, but has his moment cometoo late, asks Deaglán de Bréadún

Picture this: Britain's chancellor of the exchequer isstanding in front of the mirror, preparing his next careermove. He's rehearsing an imaginary television interview:"As prime minister, I have to say . . . Oh come on, Jeremy,you don't expect me as Prime Minister to respond to that .. . Well, speaking as head of her majesty's government, Imust tell you . . . " Suddenly an all-too-familiar facepeers out of the glass before him and Tony Blair inquiresbelligerently: "You talking to me?"

Alternatively, the face in this little fantasy might bethat of John Reid, the "safe pair of fists" whose wall-to-wall TV appearances during the Heathrow crisis arousedspeculation that he might be one man - the other iseducation secretary Alan Johnson - with a slim chance ofbeating Brown at this stage.

Future students of political science may be required toanalyse Tony Blair's current behaviour as a perfect exampleof how not to leave political office. His extraordinaryachievements in restoring a moribund Labour party to powerand winning three general elections are being overshadowedby the undignified spectacle of a man determined to stay inthe driving seat even though the wheels are falling off thecar.

Skilful manipulation of the media eased Labour's path topower, but no amount of spin-doctoring could control thefeeding frenzy this week. There were all the elements ofpolitical soap opera with allegations and rumours ofplotting, treachery and betrayal.

It still looks as if Gordon Brown will get the top job, butwill the game be worth the candle? Labour resembles afractious married couple who have their crockery-throwingsessions in the street. There are fresh doubts that theparty can win a fourth term in office, especially withcool, clean hero David Cameron, the Steve Silvermint ofBritish politics, waiting in the wings.

"Part of the problem with Brown is that he's Scottish andhas very little appeal for English voters," said anobserver with Conservative leanings. "The Labour party isonly listening to itself and not to the public."

But for the moment at least, the future looks Brown. Whatmanner of man is this, who has waited so long and withoutmuch obvious patience for the laurel wreath to be placed onhis brow?

BORN ON FEBRUARY 20th, 1951, Gordon Brown was the son of aPresbyterian minister and showed early signs of academicbrilliance. He entered the University of Edinburgh at 16where he read history and graduated with first-classhonours. An accident playing rugby left him blind in theleft eye and this was replaced by a prosthetic eye. The sonof the manse worked as a lecturer and later as a TVjournalist before winning the Commons seat for DunfermlineEast in 1983.

After the untimely death of Labour leader John Smith in1994, Brown was tipped to succeed him but made way insteadfor Tony Blair. It is part of British political folklorethat the two men struck a deal at the Granita Restaurant inIslington, north London, with Blair ceding control overeconomic policy in a future Labour government and makingother concessions to Brown in return for staying out of theleadership race.

Despite constant reports of tensions and rows, the double-act has worked remarkably well. Past experience convincedthe business and professional classes that Labour ingovernment was a recipe for high inflation andunemployment, but the cautious and sure-footed Brown hasreversed that image, presiding over the longest period ofcontinuous economic growth in British history.

As well as reassuring the moneyed classes - some criticssay he was excessively frugal and prudent - the canny Scothas protected his left flank through his leading role inefforts to reduce Third World debt and by cultivating areputation as being essentially "Old Labour" with acommitment to traditional socialist values that the ultra-pragmatic Blairites could not match. (He has used the term"Real Labour" rather than "New Labour".) Brown is also seenas less Europhile than Blair, as evidenced in his fancyfootwork over joining the single-currency zone where hetiptoed around the issue but never got his feet wet. "Hecreated a veto for himself and then he used it," says oneBrown-watcher.

EVER SINCE THAT night in the Granita (now a Mexicanrestaurant), commentators have speculated about the termsof the alleged deal which, according to some versions,included a commitment from Blair to step aside in favour ofBrown during the second term of a future Labour government.

The Granita dinner à deux took place on May 31st, 1994, orexactly 13 years prior to the date when, according to theSun newspaper this week, Tony Blair will step down asLabour leader. The way things are going, Blair may beforced out before then but, sooner or later and assuming hewins any leadership vote, Brown should be moving from No 11to a new office in No 10 Downing Street (he already has theuse of a flat in No 10). What kind of prime minister willhe make and how will he respond to the many challengesahead of him?

The dour scot is a different personality on both the socialand political levels from Tony Blair. The more amiableBlair comes across as someone willing to ditch decades ofdogma in pursuit of his aims, whereas Brown has managed topreserve the aura of an old-style social democrat butwithout allowing his hands to be tied by doctrinairepolicies. Brown sees himself as a reformer and a moderniserbut less inclined to go to extremes than the Blairites.

PERHAPS THE BIGGEST challenge Brown faces is the MiddleEast, particularly Britain's military involvement in Iraqand Afghanistan and its perceived role as chief lieutenantand cheerleader to George W Bush in the region generally.Labour left-wingers will want Brown to withdraw troops fromthese trouble-spots and put clear blue water betweenhimself and the White House on foreign-policy issues, buthis public pronouncements so far have given littleindication that he would jump in that direction. Brown is akeen student of US politics and history and has holidayedat Cape Cod for many years. He supported Britishintervention in Iraq but managed to look as if he wastaking little pleasure in it.

He will also be faced with the need to restore unity in afractured and demoralised party in time for the inevitablegeneral election, which must take place by 2010 at thelatest (there is speculation he could go for an earlyelection to give himself a personal mandate as primeminister). As for Northern Ireland, Blair has been one ofthe driving-forces in the peace process and it could be amajor test for Brown to show that he has the same level ofcommitment and zeal in pursuit of a settlement as well as asimilar ability to be nice to people he doesn't necessarilylike, in the republican and unionist camps. Some insiderssay that Brown sees Blair as spending too much time on theNorth with little result, but others insist the DUP wouldbe naive to place too much faith in their fellow-Presbyterian.

A Brown premiership will be very different in style to theBlair years. It will be less flashy and not so obviouslymedia-oriented, with far more helpings of sober purpose anddogged if unspectacular pursuit of policy objectives. TheTories under David Cameron are re-inventing themselves inall sorts of clever ways and it may be that the electorateis ready for a change. Gordon Brown has now been waiting 12years for the top job and he still must wait a littlelonger but the question is, when he finally makes it, willit be too late?

TheBrownFile

Who is he? Gordon Brown, Britain's chancellor of theexchequer and wannabe prime minister

Why is he in the news? Tony Blair won't give him the job -at least not yet

Jack Farrell of Newtown brought his collection of bottlecappers from the early 1920s to the Irish Festival at theIves Center last night.

DANBURY -- You certainly don't have to be Irish to enjoythe Irish Festival, but -- from the traditional music anddancing, the corned beef sandwiches and the displays oneverything from Celtic soldiers to old bottle cappers --you'll leave immersed in Irish culture.

Sponsored by the local Ancient Order of Hibernians, thefestival runs through Sunday.

Under the cultural tent, a host of groups is scheduled toplay traditional Irish music. On Friday, Nora Hadley playedher fiddle with four other musicians, including a flutistand an accordion player.

"I love it because it's traditional Irish music. It goesback centuries," said Julie Gallagher, a Bethel residentwho has volunteered at the festival since it began. "Youhave a variety of instruments and they're playing jigs andreels."

There will also be lots of Irish dancing -- from step-dancing, which is like "Riverdance," to Ceili dancing withcouples. There will be instruction as well as performances.

Also in the cultural tent are exhibits, including one byRalph Langham of New Fairfield, who was dressed in a 79thN.Y. Cameron Highlanders uniform -- the same one the Celticgroup wore during the Civil War with a glengarry and kilt.

"It shows how the Scottish and the Irish (descendants)worked together in the Civil War," he said.

Several people stopped to look at John Farrell's collectionof bottle cappers. More than 100 of the devices weredisplayed on five bleacher rows near the food tent.

Farrell, 80, of Newtown, said he remembers the 1920s, whenhis parents made moonshine and capped the bottles. Hestarted collecting the cappers 10 years ago and his oldestis 150 years old.

Thirteen-year-old Shannon Nolan of Danbury and severalfriends stopped to look at the collection.

A memorial has been placed in the grounds of a Dublin citycentre hospital commemorating those who fought during the1916 Easter Rising.

The tribute, organised by the National Graves Association,has been officially unveiled in the forecourt area of theRotunda Hospital, where men who had fought in the GPO andFour Courts spent the night after their surrender toBritish forces.

The Rotunda board of governors, relatives of the men andwomen of Easter week and members of the National GravesAssociation attended the ceremony.

The memorial design consists of four lilies in bronzemounted on a granite base, representing the four provinces.

NGA spokesman Paddy Lennon said it was proud to pay tributeto those who fought during Easter 1916 on the 90thanniversary of the rising.

“This is also the year that our association celebrates its80th anniversary” he said.

“Our aim back then was to mark the graves of those who diedfor Irish freedom, to erect monuments and memorials tothose of every generation who fought or devoted their livesto the cause of Irish freedom and to celebrate andcommemorate the lives of such men and women who werecriminalised for seeking this nation’s sovereignty andindependence.”

Ireland is set to become a world leader in Alzheimer’sdisease research following the annoucement of a newscientific study yesterday.

Trinity College Dublin has formed a partnership with therenowned Florida-based Roskamp Institute to examine whetheror not the blood pressure drug, Nilvadipine, can be used totreat Alzheimer's.

A key element to the success of the clinical study is theformation of a new umbrella group of clinicians in Dublinhospitals, the Dublin Ageing Research Network (DARN).Doctors of Geriatrics and Old Age Psychiatry from St James’Hospital, Beaumont Hospital, James Connolly MemorialHospital, Loughlinstown, Mater Hospital, Saint Vincent’sHospital, the Adelaide and Meath Hospital and St Patrick’sHospital will all collaborate on the scheme.

Welcoming the new partnership with the Roskamp Instituteand the establishment of DARN, Professor Brian Lawlor MDsaid that the new collaboration would enable TCIN to carryout very important research studies in coming years.

“This is a significant development not just for TrinityCollege but for brain aging research in Ireland," he said.

"Already it has enabled us to form the Dublin AgeingResearch Network comprising doctors in geriatrics and oldage psychiatry from the major Dublin hospitals to work onthis important clinical study, which could lead to aninnovative approach to a treatment for Alzheimer’s disease.Our colleagues in all of these hospitals will play a vitalrole in carrying out this important clinical study.”

If the two year trial is successful it could change thedirection of other studies of dementia.